Exam Format

Section 1A: Multiple Choice

55 Questions | 55 Minutes | 40% of Exam Score

• Questions usually appear in sets of 3–4 questions.

• Students analyze historical texts, interpretations, and evidence.

• Primary and secondary sources, images, graphs, and maps are included.

Section 1B: Short Answer

3 Questions | 40 Minutes | 20% of Exam Score

• Students analyze historians’ interpretations, historical sources, and propositions about history.

• Questions provide opportunities for students to demonstrate what they know best.

• Some questions include texts, images, graphs, or maps.

• Students choose between 2 options for the final required short-answer question, each one focusing on a different time period:

  • Question 1 is required, includes 1 secondary source, and focuses on historical developments or processes between the years 1200 and 2001.

  • Question 2 is required, includes 1 primary source, and focuses on historical developments or processes between the years 1200 and 2001.

  • Students choose between Question 3 (which focuses on historical developments or between the years 1200 and 1750) and Question 4 (which focuses on historical developments or processes between the years 1750 and 2001) for the last question. No sources are included for either Question 3 or Question 4.

Section 2A: Document-Based Question

1 Question | 1 Hour (includes 15-minute reading period) | 25% of Exam Score

• Students are presented with 7 documents offering various perspectives on a historical development or process.

• Students assess these written, quantitative, or visual materials as historical evidence.

• Students develop an argument supported by an analysis of historical evidence.

• The document-based question focuses on topics from 1450–2001.

Section 2B: Long Essay

1 Question | 40 Minutes | 15% of Exam Score

• Students explain and analyze significant issues in world history.

• Students develop an argument supported by an analysis of historical evidence.

• The question choices focus on the same skills and the same reasoning process (e.g., comparison, causation, or continuity and change), but students choose from 3 options, each focusing primarily on historical developments and processes in different time periods—either 1200–1750 (option 1), 1450–1900 (option 2), or 1750–2001 (option 3).